Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Art Interpretation

Take a look at this picture. I take part in the Weekend Wordsmith poetry challenge every week, and I read the submissions of other participants, which is how I came across it on a web page called The Ink Pot. I am truly fascinated by this painting, so much so that I wanted to share my thoughts on it. I guess I'm adding an art interpretation facet to my blog:

~~~The woman in the painting is looking at the child-wraith in the mirror, but the child in the mirror is looking at and reaching for the viewer of the painting. And the viewer is looking at the painting in the same way that the woman is looking at the child. It's as if the painting is attempting to communicate that the woman has lost something (the child), but the viewer has lost more, because he/she has lost both the woman and the child and is the worse off for it, because the woman is not the least bit interested in the viewer, and in order for the viewer to get to the child in the mirror who seems desperate to get to the viewer, he/she would have to get to the woman. That's not likely to happen, given the cobwebs both in the painting and on the frame surrounding it. The viewer, the woman and the child have been in this stalemate for quite some time.

Really, really well done, in my opinion. Fascinating from a psychological perspective.~~~

So after I wrote the above interpretation, I went and looked at the original site where this was posted by the artist. It was inspired by a movie. So maybe I'm all wet. But the image is very evocative nonetheless, and I still see in it what I stated above. Maybe I'll contact the artist and ask her.

George MacDonald

"Home is ever so far away in the palm of your hand, and how to get there it is of no use to tell you. But you will get there; you must get there; you have to get there. Everybody who is not at home, has to go home."